Alma Telescope Takes First Pictures

This is the remarkable first picture taken by the new $1.3billion radio telescope sitting high in the Chilean Andes.

It shows two galaxies colliding in a view no other telescope on Earth or in space could capture.

The shot is a teasing glimpse of the capabilities of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array telescope - this picture has been taken using only a quarter of the antennae it will have when it comes into full operation in 2013.

But even now, this shot of the Antennae Galaxies is astonishing - showing off the telescope's exceptional power at detecting 'cold' matter using radio waves. The combined image shown would not be visible at all to visible-light and infrared telescopes.

The potential this device has is unimaginable. It is crazy how much is actually in that picture. Hell i caught myself lost looking at it...which btw if you stare at it until your eyes slightly lose focus its as if it is spinning (god im tired).

Well this was taken using radio waves so we wouldnt be able to see this at all

Yeah exactly. Same with all infra-red pictures. Ofcourse it's of value to know what happens in that realm too, but it's such a letdown when many of the space pictures don't look like that in "reality" at all.

Yeah exactly. Same with all infra-red pictures. Ofcourse it's of value to know what happens in that realm too, but it's such a letdown when many of the space pictures don't look like that in "reality" at all.

Yeah its a couple pictures combined and some color editing, but its a fantastic picture and still would be a amazing view if you could watch it in person

The Dailymail is reporting this rather incorrectly - that is not a picture taken by Alma alone. It is a picture from both Alma and Hubble combined.
Here is the Hubble picture:

Here is the Alma picture:

Here they are combined:

Source is BBC and NASA.

Alma is a radio telescope, and it is designed to detect ancient radio emmissions, some of the oldest and faintest, whereas Hubble is an optical telescope. It allows us to observe the formation of galaxies in a very fundamental way, I believe.